During assembly of components on printed circuit boards, soldering fluxes are applied to the board material to facilitate soldering. After soldering, remaining flux residue must be removed. The flux chemistry determines what fluid is suitable for removing the flux. Unlike some fluxes, rosin-based fluxes are not removable with a water wash, and require more aggressive solvents that have environmental disadvantages. Such solvents generate flammable and environmentally undesirable vapors that must be safely contained, and require costly disposal methods because they cannot be drained into conventional sewer systems.
A batch cleaning system using such combustible solvents is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,027,841 to Breunsbach et al. This system is a closed loop system using only solvent to wash the PCBs in a sealed chamber that is purged with inert gas before it is opened. In the closed loop system, solvent is reused and recycled until its useful properties are exhausted. Solvent is sprayed onto the boards to mechanically dislodge and dissolve contaminants. After the PCBs are cleaned, they must be removed from the chamber and inserted in a separate apparatus for rinsing the remaining solvent off the boards. Although the inert gas purge is sufficient to eliminate any fire or explosion hazard, some solvent vapor escapes to the environment as the PCBs are transferred to the rinse apparatus.
A printed circuit board cleaning apparatus that uses a first wash fluid and a second rinse fluid in a single chamber is shown in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 07/715,441, filed Jun. 14, 1991, by Breunsbach et al. In this system, a saponifier solution wash is sprayed onto the PCBs and then drained from the chamber. A similar water rinse follows. Finally, a water and alcohol solution is sprayed onto the boards to be subsequently tested to determine cleaning effectiveness. This system does not, however, recycle or reuse the saponifier wash fluid or the rinse fluid. Only the cleanliness test solution is recycled for reuse.